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Desirableness of Active Service. 



A SEEMON 



PREACHED TO THE . 



TENTH CONNECTICUT REGIMENT, 



AT ST. AUGUSTINE, FLA., 



BY 

CHAPLAIN H. CLAY TRUMBULL. 



HARTFORD: 

PRESS OF CASE, LOCKWOOD AND COMPANY. 

1864. 



ON SABBATH, APRIL lOth, 1864r. \ 



Desirableness of Active Service. 



A SEBMON 



PREACHED TO THE 



TENTH CONNECTICUT REGIMENT, 



AT ST. AUGUSTINE, FLA., 



ON SABBATH, APRIL 10th. 186-i. 



BY 



CHAPLAIN H. CLAY TRUMBULL. 




HARTFORD: 

PRESS OF CASE, LOCKWOOD AND COMPANY. 

1864. 



'^ 



CC>E.JaESPONI3E]SrCE. 



St. Augustine, Fla., April 12th, 1864. 

Chaplain H. C. Trumbull, | 
10th Reg't C. V. ) 

Considering the sermon preached by you last Sabbath, to be peculiarly well 
adapted to the times, and believing that a wide circulation of it will prove ben- 
eficial to the service, I earnestly request that you furnish me a copy for publi- 
cation. 

Very respectfully. 

Your obedient servant, 

J. L. OTIS, Col. 

Com'g the Reg't. 



St. Augustine, Fla., April 12th, 1864. 
Colonel: 

I am glad that the sermon referred to in your kind note of this date so 
met your approval. Hoping that it may prove of service as you suggest, I 
cheerfully submit it to your discretion. And am, 

Very respectfully and cordially. 

Your Chaplain, 

H. C. TRUMBULL. 
Col. J. L. Otis, Com'g 10th C. V. 



[Note. — In partial explanation of the scripture parallelism of this sermon, it should be 
mentioned that the 10th C.V. left the North in the autumn of 1861, as a part of the 
" JJurnside Expedition " tn North Carolina — long delayed olT IIatt<>ras. In the fall of 1863, 
after a full share in the exhausting siege-work on Morris Island, it was sent to St. Augus- 
tine, where it remained until ordered, in April, 1861, to the front in Virginia. 



SERMON.. 



NUMBERS, 32 : 6. Shall your Brethren go to War, and 

SHALL YE SIT HERE ? 

The children of Israel were eno-aged in a strusrffle 
for their own national inheritance. They were bat- 
tling for possession of the^ land transmitted to them 
by Abraham and Jacob, their pilgrim fiithers, and as- 
sured to them by the Divine promise. The war, which 
seemed likely, at its opening, to prove of but brief 
duration, had been prolonged beyond the anticipa- 
tions c5f any, and some were already quite tired of 
the contest. The army of Israel had been in the 
main successful in its many encounters with the stub- 
born foe. It had seized and occupied cities deemed 
strongholds of the enemy. It had encircled fully 
the territory it claimed. And, although peaceful 
possession was still denied by disloyal inhabitants, it 
was gradually, at bloody cost, establishing rightful 
rule in all the land. In a severe pitched battle with 
the five confederate "kings of Midian, it had been. 



< 



once more, victorious, and was now restihg on the 
soil recovered from the foe. 

A new campaign was about to open. Moses was 
to retire from command. Joshua, an energetic and 
experienced Qeneral, was to succeed him at the head 
of the armies, and himself in the field, was to lead 
the entire host in a vigorous, determined move into 
the heart of the enemy's territory, which should, as 
it did, prove the termination of the struggle, the last 
great campaign of the war. Then it was that the 
soldiers of Reuben and of Gad shrunk from the 
advance and expressed a desire to rest where they 
were. 

It does not appear that these troops were lacking 
in either courage or patriotism, but for the time they 
were thinking of themselves rather than of their 
country and comrades, and their hearts went out with 
natural longing for the blessings of peace and of 
home enjoyment in place of the privations of the 
field and the perils of the front. They had already 
done good service for a number of years, enduring 
nobly and fighting often and well. They felt that 
they had performed their share of the national work, 
and earned fairly the privilege of standing by while 
others went on to complete the undertaking they 
had thus far prosecuted so vigorously. The war for 
which they had enlisted was so nearly at an end, that 



the thought of now falling before its close, and hav- 
ing no part in the benefits accruing from it, was by 
no means a pleasant one. They had had such bitter 
experience of marching and of battle, that military 
life had to them lost much of its romance and attrac- 
tiveness, and they were in no sense inchned to dis- 
pute its glory or its rewards with those who had still 
a liking for it. As a mere matter of choice, they 
would not ask to be ever again within sling or jav- 
elin range, even though their banner had no inscrip- 
tion of another blood-bought field added to the long 
list already emblazoning its folds. Perhaps, too, the 
fact that their first move must be across the tvater, 
impressed them unpleasantly in remembrance of 
their earUest experience after the opening of the 
war. They may have shrunk from another Red 
Sea expedition, which, although finally successful, 
• had caused much of murmuring and of anxiety ere 
the passage of the forbidding deep was providen- 
tially accomphshed. And under no circumstances, 
apparently, did they wish to join the army of the 
Jordan. 

Moreover, the long inaction of the Gadites and 
Eeubenites in the place of their then abode had, 
doubtless, its influence in shaping their desires and 
moulding their tastes. While they remained in the 
sand desert, where they suffered most and had most 



to do, they would have hailed gladly any order for 
a forward move which gave promise of hastening 
the longed for end of the struggle in which they had 
a part, especially in a new department and under a 
new commander. But now, they had had a fresh 
taste of the delights of civilized life. They had 
made acquaintances among the subjugated Midian- 
ites. They had become attached to some of the 
children and young. Misses who had escaped the 
victor's sword, and this acquaintance and intercourse - 
had not, in every case, elevated the standard of 
either morality or patriotism. 

Then, the region itself in which they had found 
a rest, was truly attractive. Gilead was on the East- 
ern border of the land of promise, stretching "unto 
the sea of the plain even the salt sea." It was the 
land of the pine and the cedar, the cypress, the palm, 
and the ohve. It was a health-giving locality, the • 
bairn of Gilead being a synonym of panacea, the 
universal restorative. It appears, also, by the way, 
to have been the cattle growing region of the con- 
federate kings ; according to the sacred record, " a 
land for cattle," and -behold the place was a place 
for cattle." As a whole, it was a locality so well 
suited to the tastes and needs of the war-sick sol- 
diers that many of them were willing to pass the 
remaining days of not only their enlistment but their 



lives there, and officers and men sought a title to its 
soil, that there their home might be. " And the chil- 
dren of Gad and the children of Reuben, came and 
spake unto Moses and to Eleazer the priest, and unto 
the princes of the congregation, saying, '•' * * 
if we have found grace in thy sight, let this land be 
given unto thy servants for a possession, and bring 
us not over Jordan." ^ 

" And Moses said unto the children of Gad and to 
the children of Reuben, Shall your brethren go to 
war and shall ye sit here ? " Moses knew his sol- 
diers. He understood how true and reliable were 
those who petitioned him ; and, in all confidence in 
their courage, their generosity and their patriotism, 
he reminded them, in a few fitting words, of their 
duty to themselves and to others, and of the folly of 
seeking peace and safety against the commands of 
their Divine Ruler. He suggested that the war in 
which they had fought thus far, was still going on, 
and that they could not honorably turn aside from 
it. He called to mind those who had battled with 
them, and who again needed their co-operation and 
support, and asked if they would leave them now to 
struggle unaided or to fall unQ,venged. He held be- 
fore them the fact of history, to show how God, — the 
Great Disposer — had caused to perish, almost an 
'entire generation of Israel, because of their sinful 



shrinking from a contest to which He had sum- 
moned them. 

Thus Moses reasoned. Thus Moses appealed. 
What was the result ? 

The Gadites and Reubenites — brave and noble 
soldiers as they were — had no sooner considered the 
facts presented by their General, and heard his stir- 
ring words, than as a man, they sprang forward to 
the work proposed, and expressing renewed deter- 
mination to battle to the end, asked it as a privilege 
that they might form the van guard of all the host, 
that they might lead, not follow, might do the skir- 
mishing through all the yet unrecovered possessions 
of the foe. "We ourselves," they said, "will go 
ready armed lefore the children of Israel, until we 
have brought them unto their place. * * We will 
not return unto our houses, until the children of 
Israel have inherited every man his inheritance." 
" And Moses said unto them. If ye will do this thing, 
if ye will go armed before the Lord to war, and will 
go all of you armed over ' Jordan before the Lord, 
until he hath driven out his enemies from before 
him, and the Land be subdued before the Lord: 
then afterward ye shall return, and be guiltless be- 
fore the Lord, and before Israel ; and tlm land shall 
be your possession before the Lord. But if ye will 
not do so, behold ye have sinned against the Lord : 



9 

and be sure your sin will find you out." " And the 
children of Gad and the children of Reuben spake 
unto Moses, saying, Thy servants will do as my Lord 
commandeth. * ''' * Thy servants will pass 
over, every man armed for war, before the Lord 
to battle, as my Lord saith." 

It does not by any means appear that all of the 
soldiers of Gad and Eeuben had hesitation, even at 
the outset, as to the proposed movement. Doubt- 
less, there were many among them who from the 
very start, hailed gladly the prospect of active service. 
But it is manifest that " every man " expressed his 
readiness to pass over the river, " armed for war," 
so soon as the matter was clearly understood. 

The campaign was opened. Gad and Reuben 
crossed the Jordan. Israel followed, Joshua proved 
himself the successful General. Brilliant victories 
closed the war. Finally, there was peace in Judea, 
and rest in Gilead. The gallant men of the advance 
who survived the struggle returned to their homes 
with the approving consciousness of performed duty, 
and, in the enjoyment of dearly purchased blessings, 
found such contentment and delight as they never 
could have known, but for their cheerful sacrifices 
and their prolonged endurance. Those who fell, fell 
honorably, fell in a holy cause, and their memory 
was precious to those for whom they dared and died* 
2 



10 



and will be cherished gratefully so long as history 
gives its record, and there is admiration in the world 
for noble men of noble deeds. 

Thns, with the Gadites and Eeubenites, in the 
land of Gilead and of Judea, in the long gone days ! 
Is there no lesson for us in the record of their course ? 
Were the circumstances of then^ rest, and of their 
prospective move, in every way dissimilar from 
ours. Have none here had any of the feelings which 
influenced them when first they contemplated a 
renewal of service in the field ? However these things 
may be, of one point I am sure. Among the sol- 
diers of Reuben and of Gad were no braver, nobler, 
more loyal or more generous men than are of the 
regiment I love and now address. They were' not 
more ready to be foremost in the fight, or more reli- 
able to battle on untiringly, than you — comrades of 
the Tenth will be, when you act yourselves, act delib- 
erately, act understandingly. 

There is a prospect of our being again — and that 
right speedily — in the field and at the front. Over 
this prospect let us rejoice together — rejoice; and 
why ? Because just now, active service is our duty ; 
active service is our pleasure \ active service is for 
our interest. 



11 

I. Active service is our duty. 

This war is not one of aggression but of defense. 
It is not for conquest, not for revenge ; but for nation- 
al honor and for national life. Our government — 
Divinely ordained ; over us for good ; involving 
every earthly interest for us and for ours — is assailed 
by rebels in arms, and must be protected and pre- 
served, or we are ruined and lost. If in this 
struggle we are overpowered, there is to us no 
earthly present, no earthly future. No cost is too 
great for success in such a contest. Even though 
men fall as fall the autumn leaves ; — even though 
every wife becomes a widow, every mother sonless, 
every child loses a father, and every sister a 
brother ; — even though the nation is bankrupt and 
gaunt famine stalks the land ; better, far better, this, 
than peace before victory. ■ Not until we lose all 
love of self, all love of family, all love of country? 
all love of God, shall we entertain the thought of 
suspending effort to preserve unimpaired that which 
represents and involves the whole of these. 

'^ They that take the sword shall perish with the 
sword." Having appealed to the trial of arms, the 
enemies of our government are to be met by arms — 
to be subdued by arms. Those who are loyal, able- 
bodied, and so circumstanced that they can leave 
their homes, must now "go armed before the Lord 



12 



to war," as went the Gadites and Reubenites across 
the Jordan. The only present limit to every Amer- 
ican's duty to be fighting in the field, is the call of 
the government and his ability to respond, — not his 
inclination, nor the assistance he has already ren- 
dered. Military service, just now in our land, is not 
as a levied tax of a certain percentage, to be paid by 
those who have ample means without their impov- 
erishment, but it is the claim as a positive necessity, 
upon every man's fullest possessions, in a matter of 
life and of death. There are no works of superero- 
gation in a struggle for personal or national exist- 
ence within the bounds of man's might, and his right. 
Those of our regiment who laid down their lives at 
Roanoke, or New Berne, or Kinston, or Seabrook, 
or St. Augustine, or in the hospital, or at home, or 
by the way, performed their whole duty to their 
country. Thus with those disabled in service. Thus 
with those whose years or health now render them 
exempts. Thus will it be with those whose personal 
or family circumstances shall prevent their re-enlist- 
ing at the close of their present term. Thus with 
these, but not with any who are or may be needed 
and can respond. Even if a man had been in every 
great battle of the war, from the defense of Sumpter, 
in April, three years ago, to the present day, and 
never had a furlough in all that time, if still his 
strength was unimpaired, and no family now needed 



13 

him, and his country required his further services, 
he would not yet have performed his whole duty as 
an American citizen ; for, whatever he is, and what- 
ever on earth, he has, is due unreservedly to his gov- 
ernment in its hour of imminent peril. 

"I've given one life for liberty," said Corporal 
Wheaton of our regiment, in his dying hour, " and I 
only wish I could give another." The same spirit 
showed itself in one of Belger's brave boys at the 
battle of Whitehall. His shattered hand had been 
amputated at the wrist. Looking at the bandaged 
stump, he said, sadly, " Oh dear ! its gone now. I 
don't care for myself, but what will my poor mother 
do ? " Then after a pause, he added with a sigh, " Oh 

how I wish I was " " At home ? " I asked. " No !. 

with the battery," he said warmly, for his heart was 
in the fight. As with individuals, so with regiments. 
The question should be with us of the Tenth, not 
what have we doiie ? but what can we do ? It was 
truly said in a charity sermon that, as to our offerings, 
God looks not so much at what we have given as at 
what we have leftr Our country is to be saved, 
under God, by hard fighting. Its best fighting men 
are needed now. Our regiment fights hard, fights 
well. Let it go forward ! We did not leave our 
homes to avoid danger, to enjoy social life, to have 
an easy time. We came out to fight, to follow up 



14 



the enemies of the government until they were all 
in subjection. The work is yet incomplete. We 
have strength left for it. Our enlistment still holds. 
The call comes to us. The way is open. Duty 
clearly points us on. And, 

II. So does imcUnation, loliile our comrades are en- 
gaged. 

Shall our brethren go to war, and shall we sit 
here ? Not if we are wanted and can follow. It is 
a privilege rather than a duty to make sacrifices for 
those whom we love. Who deems it a task to pre- 
pare a windmill or a kite for a child who has won 
his affections ? What son feels the care of his good 
mother a burden, or begrudges the money he stints 
himself to bestow upon her ? Who but a cowardly 
villain would stand tamely by while his sister was 
insulted, lest by interfering for her protection, he 
should endanger his precious person ? Ah, I remem- 
ber full well when the news reached us on James 
Island of the first unsuccessful assault on Fort Wag- 
ner. We heard that the Seventh Connecticut had 
charged boldly up to the parapet and been betray- 
ed by the failure of regiments on which it relied for 
support. The report of casualties was greatly exag- 
erated, and the loss of brave Connecticut boys was 
said to be fearfully large. The disaster was in all 



15 



mouths ; yet, throughout our entire regiment, as I 
passed from man to man, I heard it never said by 
any, " I am glad we were out of that ; " but, only, 
" Oh i£we could have been there. Those boys would 
have had a support." And they would have had, and 
those slaughtered thousands of the subsequent siege 
and assaults would have been spared for other ser- 
vice. When Gen. Foster was shut up in Little 
Washington, I ask how many of you would have 
preferred safety behind the intrenchments of Sea- 
brook Island to imminent peril in his attempted 
succor, had the choice been tendered you as a mere 
matter of taste, independently of the question of 
duty or honor ? I believe but few if any who had 
known him and fought in his command. And thus 
I am sure it would be with you always, when brought 
to the test. I Icnow your generosity. I have been 
witness of your acts of bravery and sacrifice. You 
have but to understand that others need your help, 
and it is given at any cost or risk, and given cheerful- 
ly and with heartiness. Your comrades require your 
presence and support elsewhere than here this Spring. 
You will aid none of them by garrisoning Fort Ma- 
rion or doing provost duty in the streets of Augus- 
tine. In North Carolina, or Virginia, or at the West ; 
under the gallant Burnside, or other noble leader ; 
side by side with Massachusetts and Connecticut 



16 



companions in former dangers and successes, you may 
be of incalculable service to many. It is by no 
means impossible that you should do as much the 
coming season, as you might have done had you been 
with the Seventh Connecticut on Morris Island on 
the eleventh of last July. Your valor, your firm- 
ness, your experience, may save an army, decide a 
battle, conclude the war. Let us then rejoice that 
as our brethren in all the army of the government 
are moving forward in a new campaign, we need not 
sit inactive here ; for it were better, far, that we 
should fall in death beside them, than that they 
should know defeat from lack of our co-operating 
services. 

And while that service is a positive duty to God, 
our country, and our comrades, we may also feel, 
that 

III. It is for our interest to re-enter the field. 

Army life as a whole, improves rather than dete- 
riorates those who pursue it. The manly and the 
moral standard is higher with soldiers than with 
others. And, as the most effective military service 
is rendered in the field, it is there that the soldier 
appears to best advantage. Active campaigning is 
as much better — for officers and men — than camp 
and garrison duty, as the latter is above the occupa- 



17 



tion of the mere money seekers or lovers of ease and 
security. Said a prominent General of our army — 
whom all knew to have felt the truth in his own 
experience — " The baptism of battle and of blood, 
makes men braver, nobler, holier." And it is so. A 
life of effort, a life of sacrifice, lifts men out of, and 
above themselves, as could no life of inaction or 
passive enjoyment of temporal advantages. In men- 
tal powers and physical ability, as in worldly goods, 
it is more blessed to give than to receive." 

" For the heart grows rich in giving ! 

All its wealth is living grain, — 
Seeds, which mildew in the garner, 

Scattered, fill with gold the plain." 

Although no trial " for the present seemeth to be 
joyous but grievous : nevertheless, afterward it yield- 
eth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them 
which are exercised thereby." Those soldiers who 
survive this war are to be better men among their 
fellows, than they could have been, but for all its 
blood and all its suffering ; and those who fall have 
fallen that the race might rise. 

But our regiment would suffer by remaining in 
such a place and life as now, longer than is necessary 
to recruit its health and prepare it for new and 
effective service at the front. 
. 3 



18 



We have reason for thanksgiving that we are 
again to be under the hallowing influence of bat- 
tle, and as to the question of personal peril, we 
know that a man is never safe except in doing his 
duty. Jonah gained nothing in comfort or security 
by fleeing to the sea when God commanded him to 
face his fellows at Nineveh. The soldier who shirks 
in the hour of danger not only fears man, but defies 
God \ and, in consequence, it is often found that 
" Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it ; 
and whosoever shall lose his life, [i. e. be willing to] 
shall preserve it." What regiments lost most men in 
the Morris Island trenches ? Those having most 
stragglers, — most who were out of place, seeking 
their own ease and safety rather than obeying 
orders and doing their duty. The old story of the 
brief action on the British man-of-war, at the close 
of which the only man found injured was a coward 
who had concealed himself in a coil of rope in the 
lower hold, and been killed by the falling of a spent 
shot on his head, is hardly more remarkable than 
frequent experiences in the war now going on. One 
of the officers captured at Wagner, in the first assault? 
told me of a man who had just started to run to the 
rear, when a shell struck him and literally cut him in 
two, while comrades near him, in their proper place, 
were uninjured. Some of ydu may recollect an in- 



19 



cident occurring on the morning of the James Island 
fight, while we stood in line of battle facing the foe. 
A man of our regiment fell out and was moving to 
the rear, when an ofl&cer called him back, and insisted 
on his again taking his place in the ranks. Hardly 
had this been done, when a huge shell from the Paw- 
nee struck in the very direction in which that man 
had been moving, and as it burst, scattered desolation 
far and wide, causing all who observed it to feel that 
the soldier who was afraid to stand at his post had 
his life or limbs preserved by being forced to do his 
duty. 

Thus it is, that while God rules we must trust Him 
for protection, feeling assured that we can never 
obtain it for ourselves by avoiding the path that in 
his providence He opens before us. Some of us will, 
doubtless, be shot down when next in action. But 
even more might fall by disease if we were permit- 
ted to remain in this locality. We know not what 
is for our safety, or what is for our good, except that 
God's way is the only right way. In that, we should 
always move cheerfully, and in confidence, rejoicing 
that we are led by One who knoweth the end from 
the beginning. 

" Thy way, not mine, Lord, 

However dark it be ! 
Lead me by thine own hand, 

Choose out the path foi: me. 



20 



" I dare not choose my lot : 
I would not, if I might ; 
Choose thou for me, my God, 
So shall I walk aright." 

Of the sad truth that not all of you are ready to 
meet the death which you may find on the battle- 
field, I am by no means unmindful. Yet, even this 
induces no desire on my part, that you should be 
kept back from active service when your country 
demands your labors at the front. You should seek 
forgiveness of your sins and hope of salvation through 
Christ, not because you must die, but because this 
seeking is your duty. " Now is the accepted time " 
to come and give yourselves in trust to Jesus. I 
entreat you to improve it. But, to do this, you have 
not to turn aside from the soldier's path of privilege 
or obligation ; you have not to forget your country, 
nor to fail her in her hour of need. " Duties never 
conflict." You can best be fitted for the future while 
being faithful in the present. You can work and 
pray at the same time. You can move toward the 
enemies of your government without moving any 
further from God, — yea, even while drawing yet 
nearer to Him. 

As now, war is a necessity ; and brave and oxpe 
rienced soldiers are demanded ; and your comrades 



21 

are re-entering the field; and you are especially 
summoned to the front ; I rejoice with you in the 
probabilities of the immediate future ; and I urge 
you to be ready for whatever God shall call you 
to— trusting in Him, through Jesus Christ our Lord, 
to give you, finally, rest here, or rest hereafter ;— hap- 
piness in an earthly home, if you survive the war ; 
happiness in a heavenly home if you fall on the field, 
or wherever you die. Work, now ! Best, by and by ! 

" Finish thy work, the time is short ; 

The sun is in the West ; 
The night is coming down — till then, 

Think not of rest. 

Finish thy work, then wipe thy brow, 

Ungird thee from thy toil ; 
Take breath and from each weary limb 

Shake oflf the soil. 

Finish thy work, then go in peace ; 

Life's battle fought and won ; 
Hear from the Throne the Master's voice, 

' Well done ! Well done ! ' " 



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